History of Information Sharing With Israel
Bullock's attorney turned over to investigators an FBI
intelligence report on the Nation of Islam whose disappearance
had caused alarm at the bureau. The search of ADL offices in San
Francisco and Los Angeles turned up more FBI materials, including
a three-volume report on a Middle East terrorist group. Moreover,
Bullock's written reports to the ADL, which he said were
channeled across the country, contained legally confidential
material that he attributed to "official friends," the ADL's
euphemism for law enforcement officers.
While denying that the ADL spies on individuals, Foxman testily
argued in an interview that the organization has a right to do
whatever it must within the law to combat antisemitism. "What are
they [the FBI volumes] doing in our files?" Foxman said. "Because
they belong in our files. ... because somebody shared it with
us."
Since news of the investigation broke, a group of Arab
Americans listed in the ADL's files has charged in a civil
lawsuit that the ADL invaded the Arab Americans' privacy with its
"massive spying operation" and forwarded confidential information
to the governments of Israel and South Africa.
Evidence of the ADL's information sharing with the Israeli
government is largely historical. In 1961, former ADL national
director Benjamin R. Epstein wrote to a B'nai B'rith official
that the ADL was following Arab diplomats and activists in
America and sharing its information with the governments of
Israel and the United States.
In his 1988 autobiography, ADL general counsel Arnold Forster,
who oversaw the fact-finding operation, described how "fact-
finding and counteraction became the heart of the organization."
He also wrote that he was often a "source" for the Mossad,
Israel's CIA, in tracking down suspected war criminals.
"ADL does not act as an agent of Israel," said Foxman,
bristling at the charge. He called such questions about ADL's
conduct "antisemitism. ... I'm sorry if it offends some people.
This is far reaching. We see a conspiracy. I see a conspiracy.
It's out there ... it's proved itself every day."
Underlying the San Francisco case is a gradual evolution in the
ADL's mission. Soon after the organization was founded, the 1915
lynching of Leo Frank, a leader of the Atlanta chapter of the
Jewish fraternal organization B'nai B'rith, caused the group to
focus much of its energy on protecting the physical safety of
Jews by publicly exposing bigotry and forcing officials to act.
Organized intelligence gathering was a natural outgrowth. In
the 1930s, the ADL "undertook a massive research operation which
uncovered the interlocking directorates of hate groups, their
links to Hitler's Germany and other centers of Nazi propaganda,"
according to an ADL account. In the civil rights era, it worked
in concert with the FBI to combat the Ku Klux Klan.
In 1975, the ADL issued a report entitled "Target U.S.A.: The
Arab Propaganda Offensive" that described how mainstream Arab-
American groups were allied with non-Arab "apologists" such as
"some church people, clergy and lay, a number of university-based
intellectuals and scholars, plus elements in the liberal
community ... some groups formerly active in the antiwar movement
during the U.S. involvement in Vietnam, plus the extreme Left,
Old and New, segments of the political Far Right, and the
traditional anti-Jewish hate fringe . . . and a small number of
anti-Israel, anti-Zionist Jews."
Once this broad rationale took hold, the civil rights watchdog
increasingly devoted its investigative apparatus to
"counteracting" what it calls "anti-Israel" sentiment or "the new
antisemitism" in the United States.
In practice, this means the ADL keeps track of politically
active Americans or groups that repeatedly criticize Israel or
lobby for Palestinian rights. The ADL argues that any threat to
Israel's "image" in America endangers the $3 billion annual
package of U.S. military and economic aid to Israel and thereby
jeopardizes the long-term fate of all Jews.
"I understand that it's difficult for other people to
understand," said Foxman, but a "viable, safe, secure haven" in
Israel is "part and parcel of the safety and security and
survival of the Jewish people."
Bullock's work as described in the lengthy transcripts of his
interviews with police and in FBI summaries of his
statements tracks the shift in the ADL's emphasis. In the 1960s
and 1970s, he focused primarily on tradtional organized
antisemitic extremist organizations. But during the 1980s,
Bullock said he increasingly focused on groups critical of
Israeli policies, such as anti-apartheid groups, but not overtly
antisemitic.
Bullock's computer database grew to include more than 10,000
names of individuals and hundreds of political, social and
business groups, including some that had worked closely with the
ADL. But his primary concentration was on groups he labeled
"Right," "Arabs," "Pinkos," and "Skins." He acknowledged sharing
his information with law enforcement, a fact investigators
confirmed when they searched Gerard's police department files and
found duplicates of Bullock's files. Bullock told police that ADL
officials knew about his database.
Bullock said he got "checks regular once-a-week" from the ADL
that were paid through Los Angeles attorney Bruce Hochman.
Hochman said in an interview that he paid Bullock at the ADL's
request to protect the undercover role.
Bullock told police that he met Gerard at a meeting at the San
Francisco ADL office and that executive director Richard
Hirschhaut was aware that Gerard was a key source.
The ADL dispatched Bullock on special assignments to Chicago
and Germany. For a particularly sensitive operation he said he
got the approval of Irwin Suall, national director of fact
finding. Both officials have come under scrutiny in the
investigation. Suall and Hirschhaut declined comment.
Bullock told police he was the ADL's "resident expert" on
antisemitism in San Francisco and maintained the ADL office
files. He said he was the only "fact finder, spy, whatever you
want to call me, on the West Coast."
Bullock monitored several of the groups profiled in the ADL's
published reports, occasional exposes that are a blend of
advocacy journalism and intelligence briefings. In 1987, Bullock
volunteered to work on a march of the Mobilization for Jobs,
Peace and Justice, a coalition of liberal groups that included
the American-Arab Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC), according
to director Carl Finamore.
"He [Bullock] just showed up at our office one day to help. He
comes in, he's friendly, insinuates himself, asserts himself,
tells a little bit about his personal background to get you
interested in him as a human being, makes suggestions," Finamore
said.
Some `Material Is Clearly Contraband'
The ADL wanted information on the ADC, a group that challenges
defamatory Arab stereotypes, because it considered the
organization a "highly active pro-PLO propaganda group." An ADL
report said the ADC's members favor "political support for
suspected PLO terrorists residing in the U.S."
Bullock also volunteered at the ADC's San Francisco Bay Area
chapter, where he carried banners, helped with crowd control
during demonstrations and took photographs, according to Osama
Doumani, who at the time served as the ADC's regional director.
"He would come to my office and he would hug me in a comradely
fashion and volunteer for work. He wanted to have a presence
whenever we had something important," he said.
The ADL has labored to draw a distinction between Bullock's
more controversial activities and work he was authorized to do
for ADL, leaving investigators largely unconvinced.
In a court affidavit, San Francisco Police Inspector Ronald
Roth said that based on a comparison of Bullock's database with
the seized ADL records, "It is believed that Bullock's databases
are in fact the ADL databases."
Assistant District Attorney Thomas Dwyer argued in court that
"some of that [ADL] material is clearly contraband." The ADL, he
said, does not "have the right to rap sheet photographs; they do
not have the right to people's fingerprint cards."
But Foxman and other ADL officials say its fact finders
basically employ the methods of investigative journalists, taking
notes at public meetings, culling published material for facts,
and cultivating law enforcement sources, in order to publish
important exposes about bigotry and prejudice.
"It's a First Amendment right," Foxman said. "We have a right
to gather information and to disseminate it. ... We look at
pieces. We look at individuals. We look at ideologies."
[end]
The Washington Post
October 19, 1993
page A13
EVOLUTION OF THE ANTI-DEFAMATION LEAGUE
FULL NAME: Anti-Defamation League of B'nai B'rith.
MISSION: "The immediate object of the league is to stop, by
appeals to reason and conscience, and if necessary, by
appeals to law, the defamation of the Jewish people and
to secure justice and fair treatment to all citizens
alike." (ADL founding charter, 1913)
ORGANIZATION: National director Abraham H. Foxman oversees 200
staff members who work in New York, Washington, and 30
regional offices in major cities. About 15,000 ADL
supporters donate time, money and advice.
BUDGET: $31 million in 1992, chiefly raised through donations to
the ADL, which is a tax exempt 501(c)(3) nonprofit
foundation established for educational purposes.
BRIEF HISTORY: